British public housing tenants who say they're embarrassed when they hear their neighbors' lovemaking get no relief from their local government - the top British court has ruled local governments don't have to soundproof the buildings.
The Law Lords ruled the London boroughs Southwark and Camden do not have to pick up the tab for soundproofing a block of twenty council flats in Herne Hill and a converted Victorian townhouse in Kentish Town.
"I can hear all the private and most intimate moments in my neighbors' lives," said one resident to Reuters. "(C)onversations, what TV station they are watching, when they go to the toilet, and when they make love."
The high court ruled the normal sounds of ordinary life should be expected and that, in those circumstances, landlords could not be obliged to make soundproofing improvements, Reuters says.
If the Law Lords had ruled the opposite, it's estimated that local governments running British public housing could have faced staggering costs.
